Read The Abyss Beyond Dreams Online
Authors: Peter F. Hamilton
Tags: #Fiction, #Science Fiction, #Space Opera
The Abyss Beyond Dreams
For my agent, Antony Harwood.
After twenty years, it’s probably
about time I said thank you.
In a unique project aimed at enhancing the reader’s experience, composer Steve Buick has produced an album of musical atmospheres inspired by Peter F. Hamilton’s new
novel
The Abyss Beyond Dreams.
There are three long pieces which embody the feel of the story using layers of ambient and often eerie soundscapes. Peter actually wrote part of the novel to
the first track Steve completed. The album is available on iTunes and the Amazon MP3 store under the same title.
More information can be found at
www.stevebuick.com
BOOK ONE: Twenty-Seven Hours and Forty-Two Minutes
BOOK TWO: Dreams from the Void
Two Months Earlier: May 17th 3326
BOOK THREE: Revolution for Beginners
1,000,000 BC (approx.)
Raiel armada invades the Void. Never returns.
AD
1200
Prime species’ home star system and renegade Prime colony star (Dyson pair) quarantined behind force fields by the
Anomine.
1900
Starflyer crash-lands on Far Away, 400 light years from Earth.
2037
First attempted human rejuvenation, Jeff Baker.
2050
Nigel Sheldon and Ozzie Isaacs open a wormhole to surface of Mars.
2057
Wormhole opened to Proxima Centuri. Start of interstellar colonization.
2100
Eight new worlds settled. Official formation of Intersolar Commonwealth Council, the ‘Parliament of
Worlds’.
2100 onward
Massive expansion of human settlements across H-congruous planets. Rise of the Big15 industrial worlds.
2102
Huxley’s Haven founded, genetic conformist constitution.
2150
Prime star disappears from Earth’s sky – unnoticed.
2163
High Angel
discovered orbiting Icalanise
2222
Paula Myo born on Huxley’s Haven.
2270
Prime star pair identified as Dyson Emission Spectrum twins.
2380
Dudley Bose observes Dyson Alpha vanish.
2381
Starship
Second Chance
flies to Dyson Alpha.
2381–2383
Starflyer War.
2384
First colony fleet (Brandt Dynasty) leaves to found human colony outside Commonwealth.
2545 onward
Use of large starships to establish Commonwealth ‘External’ worlds.
2550
Commonwealth Navy Exploration fleet founded to explore the galaxy beyond the External worlds.
2560
Commonwealth Navy ship
Endeavour
circumnavigates galaxy, captained by Wilson Kime, discovery of the Void.
2603
Navy discovers seventh
High Angel
-type ship.
2620
Raiel confirm their status as ancient galactic race who lost a war against the Void.
2833
Completion of ANA (Advanced Neural Activity) first stage on Earth. Grand Family members begin memory download into ANA.
2867
Sheldon Dynasty gigalife project partially successful, first human body biononic supplements for regeneration and general
iatrics.
2872
Start of Higher human culture, biononic enrichment allowing a society of slow-paced long life, rejection of commercial
economics and old political ideologies.
2913
Earth begins absorption of ‘mature’ humans into ANA, the inward migration begins.
2984
Formation of radical Highers who wish to convert the human race to Higher culture.
3000
Sheldon Dynasty colony fleet (thirty starships) leaves Commonwealth, believed to possess long-range trans-galactic flight
capability.
3001
Ozzie produces uniform neural entanglement effect, known as the gaiafield.
3040
Commonwealth invited to join Centurion Station, the Void observation project supervised by Raiel, a joint enterprise
between alien species.
3120
ANA officially becomes Earth’s government, total planetary population fifty million (activated bodies) and
falling.
3126
Brandt Dynasty trans-galactic colony fleet launched.
3150
External world Ellezelin settled.
3255
Kerry, a radical Higher Angel, arrives on Anagaska, Inigo’s conception.
This Era (time uncertain)
Edeard born in the Void.
3320
Inigo begins duty tour at Centurion star system, his first dream.
3324
Inigo settles on Ellezelin, founds Living Dream movement, begins construction of Makkathran2.
Commonwealth
Nigel Sheldon
inventor of wormhole technology
Paula Myo
Senior investigator, Serious Crime Bureau
Starship
Vermillion
Cornelius Brandt
captain
Laura Brandt
Molecular physicist
Ibu
Gravatonics professor
Joey Stein
hyperspace theorist
Ayanna
quantum field physicist
Rojas
shuttle pilot
Bienvenido
Slvasta
lieutenant Cham Regiment, revolutionary leader
Ingmar
trooper, Cham Regiment, Slvasta’s friend
Quanda
forester’s daughter
Bethaneve
tax officer, revolutionary leader
Javier
meat-stall worker, revolutionary leader
Coulan
bureaucrat, revolutionary leader
Arnice
Major, Joint Regimental Council
Lanicia
society debutant
Gelasis
Colonel, Joint Regimental Council
Bryan-Anthony
leader, Wellfield union
Philious
Captain
Aothori
First officer
Trevene
chief of Captain’s Police
Gravin
professor, Faller Research Institute
Kysandra
owner of Blair Farm
Sarara
Kysandra’s mother
Ma Ulvon
underworld boss
Akstan
Ma Ulvon’s son
Julias
Ma Ulvon’s son
Russell
Ma Ulvon’s son
Madeline
madam, Hevlin hotel
Proval
a Faller
Demitri
ANAdroid
Marek
ANAdroid
Valeri
ANAdroid
Fergus
ANAdroid
Yannrith
ex-sergeant Cham regiment
Andricea
ex-Cham regiment
Tovakar
ex-Cham regiment
Twenty-Seven Hours and Forty-Two Minutes
Laura Brandt knew all about coming out of a suspension chamber. It was similar to finishing the old-style rejuvenation procedure she’d undergone back in the day before
biononic inserts and Advancer genes being sequenced into human DNA and practically eradicating the ageing process. There would be that slow comfortable rise to consciousness, the body warming at a
steady rate, nutrient feeds and narcotic buffering taking the edge off any lingering discomfort and disorientation. So, by the time you were properly awake and ready to open your eyes, it was like
emerging from a really decent night’s sleep, ready to face the day with enthusiasm and anticipation. A full breakfast with pancakes, some crisp bacon, maple syrup and chilled orange juice (no
ice, thanks) would add that extra little touch of panache to make returning to full awareness a welcome experience. And when it happened this time, there she would be at the end of a voyage to a
star cluster outside the Milky Way, ready to begin a fresh life with others from the Brandt dynasty, founding a whole new civilization – one that was going to be so very different from the
jaded old Commonwealth they’d left behind.
Then there was the emergency extraction procedure, which ship’s crew called the tank yank.
Someone slapping the red button on the outside of her suspension chamber. Potent revival drugs rammed into a body that was still chilly. Haematology umbilicals withdrawing from her neck and
thighs. Shocked muscles spasming. Bladder sending out frantic pressure signals into her brain, and the emergency extraction had already automatically retracted the catheter – oh, great
design, guys. But that wasn’t as bad as the skull-splitting headache and the top of her diaphragm contracting as her nauseous stomach heaved.
Laura opened her eyes to a blur of horrible coloured light at the same time as her mouth opened and she vomited. Stomach muscles clenched, bringing her torso up off the padding. Her head hit the
chamber’s lid, which hadn’t finished hinging open.